A 1988 horror movie, directed by William Lustig and produced by Larry Cohen.

The film tells a story of Matt Cordell (Robert Z'Dar), a former NYPD officer who was sentenced to prison for his excessive Police Brutality. He suffered heavy abuse in jail from the scum whom he had arrested himself and was left heavily scarred and brain-damaged from their attacks. He is now presumed by most people to be long dead. Cordell starts wreaking havok in New York by dressing as a cop and murdering innocent civilians, which leads to city-wide panic. Detective McRae (Tom Atkins) is set to work on the case and is later joined by Officer Forrest (Bruce Campbell) who is framed for the killings and must clear his name.

He Knows Too Much: Cordell was a hero on all accounts, but his arrest was arranged by corrupt politicians for accidentally getting too close to certain organized criminal members, who had dealings with them.

Improbable Aiming Skills: For being a brain damaged walking corpse, Cordell is a crack shot on the few occasions he uses his revolver, getting six for six headshots at the start of his police station massacre (before he switches to a bigger gun and another trope kicks in) and throwing his first victim in the third film high into the air and plugging him repeatedly before he hits the ground.

In the original script, Cordell was explicitly undead in the first film as well (it was noted that his wounds didn't bleed). This was altered in the finished product, but remnants of it, such as his unnaturally cold hands and his Made of Iron status, clearly remain.

Murder Into Malevolence: Subverted. The eponymous character was Lawful Good before being framed, sent to jail, and subsequently attacked in prison. In this case, it's implied that he's a Revenant Zombie (which the sequel confirms and runs with), but his more brutal behavior is down to brain damage changing his personality rather than being undead.

Name's the Same: The character of Frank McRae shares his name with the actor of the same name.

No Peripheral Vision: Detective Mallory leaves an interrogation room and talks to the man overseeing it, only to find him to be a corpse. Then Forrest exits the room and the camera pans to the left, revealing another corpse that should have been in the field of her vision.

No-Tell Motel: Forrest's wife follows him into a motel after he leaves their home, and finds him there in the embrace of another woman.

Offscreen Teleportation: After Cordell unsuccesfully tries to kill Officer Mallory, she and McRae empty their revolvers at him. He disappears between cuts after this happens.

Re-Cut: Some releases of the film include additional scenes involving the corrupt mayor, including a scene at the very end where Cordell gets him which were added to beef up the running time for television airings.

Shout-Out: The concept of a uniformed Killer Cop committing serial killings harkens back to the Dirty Harry installment Magnum Force. Furthermore, the character of Jack Forrest during the first half is basically fulfilling the role of Charlie McCoy (who was played by Mitch Ryan, who co-starred with Tom Atkins, who plays Decoy Protagonist Frank McRae, in Lethal Weapon a year earlier before this movie's release) as a troubled cop with marriage problems who is initially suspected for the killings.

Sword Cane: Cordell's weapon of choice is a blade hidden in a billy club.

Title Drop: After hearing from McRae that innocent people are being killed by an assailant dressed as a police officer, Ginny proclaims "Jesus, maniac cop?"

The Voiceless: Cordell for most of the time, but he opens his mouth once during the second and third movie.

He also screams at the very end of the first film when he's impaled by a suspended pipe. Though considering how much this clashes with the rest of the film, it might count as Discontinuity.

Your Cheating Heart: Forrest's wife thinks that his long night shifts are cover for the fact that he is the Maniac cop, but following him one night reveals that he is instead cheating on her with Officer Mallory. She dies soon after making this discovery.

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